RE: Student Native Network
Kativik School Board is responsible for schools located in the Arctic regions
of Quebec in Canada. Our students are Inuit, whose first language is Inuktitut
and who also study in either French or in English as their second language.
The school board contains 14 schools and approximately 2500 students. Their
settlements are accessible by plane, water or in winter by snowmobiles and are
several hundred kilometers apart, spreading over some 5000 kilomters of
coastline. In order to minimize the isolation of our students, one from
another as well as from other students around the globe, Kativik has had an
in-house Email system for some 8 years. Through it our students have had
opportunity to make pen-pal links with students in southern Canada.
In view of 1993 being the International Year for the World's Indigenous
Peoples, we want to use the current school year to emphasize inter-indigenous
student communications.
Kativik School Board is currently trying to assess the most appropriate Email
linkup with other aboriginal students in Canada and other parts of the world.
Since NativeNet has a world-wide audience, it may prove to be the most
interesting of the various possibilities. However it is necessary to also
alert and involve other schools and students that such a conference would be
available. Only if enough schools respond to this "interest" survey would we
be prepared to open gateways for our students.
School systems interested in participating in such a link-up should respond to
this message and I will contact Gary S. Trujillo to see if such a conference
could be arranged under Nat-Edu.
Dirk Vermeulen
PS: If you are aware of other networks we could investigate for the above
project, please share the info. Thank you.
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Response from NativeNet founder and co-facilitator Gary Trujillo
(gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us):
Again, I am redirecting this article from NAT-LANG to NATIVE-L, and I'll
send a copy to NAT-EDU to make sure subscribers of that list see it as
well (apologies if you're on both lists and get two copies thereby).
At the risk of troubling those who don't like long articles, I am
taking the liberty of copying the text of an article that I posted to
the NAT-EDU list back in June in response to an article from Bill
Coppinger in Australia, including most or all of the text of that
article (they appear preceded by the ">" notation). I recently got
a note from Bill saying the project is about to begin. Now is the
time to get on board if anyone is interested. I suggest that we
use the NAT-EDU mailing list for the purpose. (Subscribers to the
APC member systems [IGC, Web, Pegasus, GreenNet, NordNet, etc.]
can use the linked "native.edu" conference for the purpose, as
well as the "i*earn.fp" conference which Bill and his cohorts have
established to coordinate the project on a worldwide basis.)
Again, I suggest that anyone interested in this project and/or
the one described by Dirk above (which may turn out to be the
same thing) subscribe to the NAT-EDU mailing list (see the
included article below for details).
Gary
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Subject: I*EARN FIRST PEOPLES PROJECT 93
Message-ID: <m0o9fDC-0001RZC@gnosys.svle.ma.us>
Date: Sat, 26 Jun 1993 19:42:50 GMT
PLEASE COPY THIS ARTICLE TO OTHER NEWSGROUPS AND MAILING LISTS -
especially ones dealing with education and other subjects relevant
to promoting international cooperation and understanding.
This article contains comments on a recent proposal posted to the
web.native conference on APC systems as well as to the NATIVE-L
mailing list and the soc.culture.native Usenet newsgroup. I like
the idea of the project, and hope that others will help these ideas
become a reality! I feel it would be an ideal project for members
of the NAT-EDU mailing list to pursue jointly.
Gary
In <744800005@peg.pegasus.oz.au> bcoppinger@peg.pegasus.oz.au writes:
> ) I*EARN FIRST PEOPLES PROJECT )
>
> **1993 is the INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF INDIGENOUS PEOPLE**
>
> 1. This project is designed to highlight the cultures,histories and
> current issues facing the First Peoples from around the World...
Before going into details, let me remind readers of this article who may
have missed the original posting of the purpose of the project:
> It is hoped that this project will encourage students participating
> in the project to develop an awareness of First Peoples by actively
> involving themselves in the efforts to resolve many of the concerns
> being raised by representatives of Indigenous Peoples from around the
> world.
and the other details mentioned:
> 2. This project is open to any age group from primary/elementary
> students right through to Senior High School or Teriary students.
>
> 3. It is envisaged that this project will develop as part of the
> school curriculum and expand into extra-curricular work as well.
>
> 4. Proposed starting date: May 3rd 1993
>
> 5. Proposed ending date:December10th1993 (World human Rights Day)
> This is negotiable for Northern and Southern Hemispheres
>
> 6. The expected outcomes from this project are many and varied.
> Specifically, we are hoping to encourage three levels of involvement
> in this project, participants can choose to involve themselves in any
> combination of these levels.
I would hope that students in North America would be willing to
participate. However, summer vacation has just begun (unlike in
Australia, where this suggestion originates). I wonder whether it
might be possible to find a way that North American students might
be able to participate starting next fall, when they will return to
their classes.
> We wish to encourage active communication with Indigenous
> People's groups through Telecommunications. This will simply entail
> e-mail contacts throught the APC Networks.
For those reading this article to whom the term "APC" means nothing, I
will say that the term refers to the member systems of the worldwide
network known as the Association for Progressive Communications. The
member systems are located in quite a number of countries around the
world. The poster of the original article, for example, writes from
the Pegasus/Earthnet system in Australia. Other member systems in
English-speaking countries include Web in Canada, GreenNet in the U.K.,
and IGC (PeaceNet/EcoNet) in the U.S.
Further, though the original article was posted to the "web.native"
electronic conference, it has been relayed automatically to the NATIVE-L
mailing list as well as to the soc.culture.native Usenet newsgroup, where
it is able to reach many thousands of readers.
I would like to suggest that the APC networks be considered as merely one
possible entry-point for students and teachers wishing to participate in
this project. There is no reason why telecommunications links cannot be
forged by a variety of means to permit wider participation than the APC
network can provide by itself. In fact, I would like to offer the facil-
ities of the NAT-EDU mailing list, facilitated by Mark Dewart and Mary
Ellen Sword. I operate the gateway system which links various mailing
lists on subjects pertaining to indigenous peoples, collectively known
under the term "NativeNet," including NAT-EDU, which is linked with the
"native.edu" conference on APC systems (if you are reading this article on
an APC system, and cannot access native.edu, please send me a message, and
I will make arrangements for that conference to be "networked" to your own
APC member system).
I suggest that anyone interested in actively participating who is not a
subscriber to an APC member system subscribe to the NAT-EDU mailing list
by sending a message containing:
subscribe nat-edu Your Name
to the address "listserv@indycms.iupui.edu"
We can use the NAT-EDU/native.edu mailing list / conference initially
for communications, and create more specialized vehicles if need be
after we've established that there is significant interest in working
on this project.
> If these contacts do not
> already exist, then the obvious project would be to make sure that you
> could establish a link with a First People's group and work to
> encourage a partner relationship at least for the duration of the
> project (Much longer than this we hope!)
Perhaps we should think about compiling a list of such groups which could
get people started. I have some resources on the subject, and would be
willing to try to help anyone find a group in their own geographic area.
> We hope to develop concrete examples of the collaboration that
> is encouraged in point one! We hope to create a series of joint
> publications that act as a showcase for participants writings or
> artwork around the topics of;
>
> "First Peoples 1993; Where to from here??"
>
> We would like to create a conference for this topic to
> encourage as much discussion of the issues that are deemed relevant,
> as possible.
If such an APC conference is in fact created, I can see to it that it
is networked to all APC systems and that it becomes linked with a new
mailing list.
> We would like to encourage I*EARN Students to write for the
> Contemporary and A Vision and develop themes along the lines of the
> International Year of Indigenous Peoples.
Perhaps the original poster of this proposal could tell us more about
these publications.
> It is hoped that we could collate writings and art work during
> the month of October (Amnesty International Week 18-22 Oct) and then
> have the work published and distributed to all contributors prior to
> December 1st 1993.
Is the intent to distribute printed publications via snail-mail?
> We would like to celebrate our work and the
> designation of 1993 as the International Year of Indigenous Peoples by
> holding a YOUTH SUMMIT via teleconferencing and e-mail links to join
> students from around the world in an attempt to lodge a student
> charter with the United Nations and Amnesty International groups in
> our respective countries. It is hoped that we could get
> representatives from as many First Peoples societies as possible to
> participate in this event.
Again, I can help set up electronic vehicles for such an event.
Following is the remainder of the original article, for those who missed
it the first time around:
> 7. How will this project make a contribution to others and the planet?
> Please describe.
>
> This project is designed to raise the awareness of all members
> of our global community to the pressures and problems facing
> indigenous peoples around the globe. It is hoped this project will
> develop bonds of true understanding and trust based on efforts to work
> towards common goals for the good of all. It is a genuine effort by
> youth of the world to set a global role model for others to consider.
>
> 8. This project can involve either individual students or entire
> classes. It is hoped that the three levels of participation as
> outlined will encourage everyone to have a go!!
>
>
> 9. We envision that this project will go ahead with simply the
> student contributions from one school,albeit a rather narrow exercise.
> We would hope that a minimum of 5 schools would be willing to share
> their ideas and concerns in this topic. We would hope to get ten times
> that many contributions!!
>
> 10. Username of project proposer: peg:broadfordsc peg:bcoppinger
> (student id)
>
> 11. Name of project contact person: Jenelle Evers Michael Barton
> Melanie Russell Amanda Chick
> Bill Coppinger (Teacher)
> Ben Mcmahon
--
Gary S. Trujillo gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us
Somerville, Massachusetts {wjh12,bu.edu,spdcc,ima,cdp}!gnosys!gst